


Uniformity

by madcat



Category: Primeval
Genre: Background Relationships, Gen, What even is this POV, third person random
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-25
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-07-17 11:38:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16094909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madcat/pseuds/madcat
Summary: Uniforms seem to have followed James Lester all his life.





	Uniformity

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to Livejournal in 2010 as a birthday gift for Joereaves on Primeval_Denial. Lightly edited and re-posted here now my livejournal is dead.

Uniforms seem to have followed James Lester all his life.

The first that he really remembers is the dark blue of his father’s dress uniform as he stands next to a young James, both of them still and silent beside James’ mother’s grave. Neither of them are sure what to say to the other because she was always the one that connected them, gave them purpose… gave them something to say to one another beyond greetings and accusations.

The next uniform is the harsh green of the army cadet uniform he is forced to wear. It’s an unwelcome reminder of the fact that he never wanted the strict rigidity of the military; he’d simply wanted university, space and the freedom to make his own choices. In the end he gets his wish of university, although his father is insistent that it’s just another step on the road to Sandhurst.

After that it’s the black and white uniform that the police officer wears, accompanying the strange monotone in which he delivers the fateful news. Car crash, drunk driver, death was instantaneous; the words wash over him even as James realises that he’s finally free of his father, and he immediately feels guilty for having such a thought.

So James heads into the Civil Service. He even almost convinces himself that it’s purely because he’s good at it rather than because it would cause his father to spin in his grave. He buys his first Savile Row suit, shakes the right hands and buries any politically inconvenient ideas about how he actually wants to live his life as deep as he possibly can.

It’s not until three years later that he realises his immaculately pressed suit has become a uniform of its own.

Life moves on. James marries and has children, owns a nice house in the countryside and a flat in central London and he pretends that he’s happy.

Happy until his world comes crashing down again with the news of dinosaurs and anomalies and irritating scientific types who are determined to make any sort of cover-up impossible. The implications of such anomalies is enough to send the most rational of minds running for cover, so James handles it the best way he knows how: with paperwork and large doses of sarcasm and he hopes and prays that it will all go away sooner rather than later.

Of course, luck has never been predictable and James knows that waiting for God to get back to you is on about the same level of stupidity as expecting a straightforward answer from a politician. So he muddles on as best he can and calls in as many favours as he dares, because James Lester has never failed at anything and he’ll be damned if he lets someone like Nicholas Cutter get it all his own way.

This all leads to him being haunted by uniforms yet again, as Captain Ryan and his teams become regular visitors first at the anomaly sites, then at the Home Office and finally permanent residents at the ARC itself.

James is perfectly willing to admit that he used the unwelcome presence of several muddy, heavily armed and dangerous-looking soldiers at the Home Office on a daily basis to influence certain people into voting in favour of the ARC project.

And then his work becomes yet another uniform of sorts, a way of convincing people that he’s perfectly fine when he’s falling apart at the seams and staring at the divorce papers sitting on his desk. His wife’s words and signature in black and white just confirm what he’s been denying to himself for the last two years.

Strangely though, it all starts to get easier after that. They all have their ups and their downs, but the possibility of being eaten by a creature that should have died out millions of years ago is strangely liberating and James Lester finds himself in the position of having friends. Their relationships may be defined by the ever-present snark that he still uses as something of a shield to hide behind, but he begins to suspect that they wouldn’t really want him any other way… well, except maybe Cutter.

It’s around about the time that he starts to relax into this new-found equilibrium that another uniform strolls into his life, bouncing straight through the barriers James has created around himself over the years like they don’t exist. Unlike the other uniforms in his past, this one varies between the hated green of the dress uniform, the black fatigues of the everyday uniform and the permanently mud-stained oversuit of the weekends and days off uniform.

The uniform may change, but the ability to see straight through even James’ most carefully constructed façade remains the same throughout and James finally finds that he doesn’t really mind someone seeing him for who he really is, flaws and imperfections included.


End file.
